Interview: Beyond the Black Rainbow Director Panos Cosmatos

Anyone bored with the current crop of big budget studio movies in theaters and are looking for something a little different – perhaps something that harks back to the great genre movies of the early ’80s – should look no further than Panos Costmatos’ Beyond the Black Rainbow, an homage to the midnight movies and video store cult faves, many which have been so extremely inspirational to today’s horror filmmaker.

The majority of his film takes place at an institute founded by the mysterious Mercurio Arboria where one Dr. Barry Nyle, played by Michael Rogers (Hellraiser: Hellseeker), has been focusing his examinations on one particular subject, a young woman named Elena (Eva Allen), who has been at the institute for years and seems to possess unimaginable power.

Cosmatos is a second generation filmmaker of Greek descent who has been making DIY short films in Vancouver, Canada for years, and with his debut feature Beyond the Black Rainbow, he’s already channeling the likes of Alejandro Jodorowsky and Stanley Kubrick to create a surreal and trippy film unlike anything else you’ve experienced, with a slow moody pace that often explodes with violence as it delves into the realm of science fiction and horror. Shock Till You Drop spoke to Cosmatos before when the film premiered at last year’s Tribeca Film Festival and we decided to speak to him again with the film’s theatrical release by Magnet Releasing.